contribution
Interview with William Yijiang Li: vision language models and the physical world
At the International Conference on Machine Learning (ICML 2026),, and presented their work Vision Language Models Cannot Reason About Physical Transformation . In this interview, William Yijiang Li tells us more about the research, the method the team used, and the controlled experiments they carried out. What is the topic of the research in your paper and why is it an interesting area for study? Our research asks a fairly fundamental question: do vision-language models actually understand how the physical world changes over time? Modern vision-language models are increasingly being used in areas such as robotics, embodied agents, and video understanding.
Congratulations to the #IJCAI2026 award winners
The winners of three International Joint Conferences on Artificial Intelligence (IJCAI) awards have been announced . These three distinctions are: the, the and the . The Research Excellence award is given to a scientist who has carried out a program of research of consistently high quality throughout an entire career yielding several substantial results. The winner of the 2026 Award for Research Excellence is Nicholas R. Jennings, Vice-Chancellor and President of Loughborough University, UK. Professor Jennings is recognized for his seminal contributions to the field of multi-agent systems, including algorithms for multi-agent coordination and the principles of human-agent teamwork, and for his pioneering applications of autonomous agents and multi-agent systems.
Now you can chat with Google Maps to order food, reserve hotels and more
This past March, Google introduced a chatbot inside of Maps as part of its overhaul of the software's navigation suite. The company pitched the feature, Ask Maps, as a way to give users a way to obtain information no traditional map can provide. Today, Google is expanding what Ask Maps can do, starting with the addition of new agentic capabilities. The next time you feel like ordering food, you can do so directly through Ask Maps. In a press briefing, Amanda Leicht-Moore, senior product director of Google Maps, demoed the feature by telling the chatbot she wanted recommendations for avocado toast and an oat milk latte near her home.
Congratulations to the 2026 EurAI distinguished service award winners
The EurAI Distinguished Service Award started in 2012, and it is presented annually to individuals who have made exceptional contributions to the European AI community. This year, the award goes to two researchers: Jérôme Lang and Luc de Raedt. Find out who won the small, middle and large divisions in Incheon. Find out the latest from day two of the competition. In the first of our round-ups from the humanoid league we introduce the competition, and report some preliminary results.